Wie man Erfolg hat, ohne sich besonders anzustrengen

I've lived in the Metropolitan New York area all my life but the first musical I ever saw was the revival of How to Succeed in Business with Matthew Broderick in the title role. This prompted me to purchase the original musical with Robert Morse and I was not disappointed. My wife preferred the live musical, however what attracted me to the video was the performance of Rudy Vallee as Mr Bigly. Frank Loesser's score is marvelous, I think that the song "The Company Way" is a humorous parody of those corporate types who risk nothing that will damage their careers. This video is one that I've watched over and over and I can recommend to any musical lovers other than ardent feminists who might be turned off by the 1960s type relationships between the men and women.

This was one of the rare Broadway musicals whose book is actually more interesting than its score. So while roughly a half-dozen Frank Loesser songs from the stage version are deleted, they're not really missed. What survives is a witty skewering of office politics, featuring much of the Broadway cast. And while such '60s business staples as rampant sexism and smoking now look quaintly offensive, the gleeful satirizing of backstabbing and skulduggery in business will always be relevant. David Swift, whose training was in TV, doesn't do much with the widescreen format (except for the ingenious ballet-mechanique in "A Secretary Is Not a Toy"), but he cuts cleverly away from the production numbers just as the musical-comedy silliness is on the verge of becoming embarrassing, and he splices in some delectable location shots of '60s New York. The color scheme is bright, the pacing brisk, the cast friendly, the production values refreshingly modest. At a time in movie history when so many adaptations of stage hits were overbudgeted and overlong, what a pleasure to see something to faithful to its source material -- and so unpretentious.

Today, at 77 years old, Robert Morse is still going strong as Mad Men's Cooper, but there's no question that his heyday was the late '50s to the early '70s, when his toothy grin, amiable tenor and boyish acting made him the toast of Broadway. Here, he repeats his Broadway success as J. Pierpont Finch in "How to Succeed In Business Without Really Trying," a 1967 film also starring Michele Lee, Rudy Vallee, and Anthony Teague. Lee and Vallee also repeat their Broadway roles.

With music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Abe Burrows, "How to Succeed" is the story of window washer J. Pierpont Finch, who in a matter of days, thanks to a book he carries around by the same name as the film title, has risen through the ranks of the Worldwide Wicket Company without doing any work. He has his enemies, but one very good friend in Rosemary (Lee), a secretary with a crush on him who wants Ponty, as he is called, to make good.

I'm not all that familiar with the musical, but I understand that there are several songs missing, including "Happy to Keep His Dinner Warm." The standouts are "I Believe in You," which became a hit song, and the rousing "Brotherhood of Man." What makes the music for me is the wonderful orchestrations.

Sexist today in some of its themes, this is a brightly-colored musical, done the old-fashioned way, without cutting the numbers to pieces. Morse is delightful and never had any trouble adapting to film. Ditto a young, pretty Lee who sings "I Believe in You" like a dream. Vallee is well cast as the head of the company who has a girlfriend on the side. Anthony Teague is very good as the boss' nephew, but Charles Nelson Reilly played this role on stage, and I can only imagine how hilarious he was in the role.

Good movie, and director David Swift keeps the pace moving.

Except for four songs being dropped and a slight altering of the original story's pacing, this is a flawless translation of a Broadway classic to the big screen, making great use of New York locations and retaining Robert Morse in the best role of his entire career as the ambitious window washer J. Pierrepoint Finch who climbs his way up the corporate ladder by every little trick in a book that the musical takes it's title from. Morse's timing and delivery is perfect and everyone who's played the part of Finch since on Broadway (most notably Matthew Broderick a few years back) have had to emulate his basic approach to the part.

Michele Lee is also perfect as the secretary Rosemary who is madly in love with Finch. Her sexy solo of "I Believe In You" (a vast improvement over the stage's "Happy To Keep His Dinner Warm") makes you wish she hadn't given up Broadway for TV success because she has one of the best singing voices you'll ever hear.

I saw this movie on a local PBS station for the first time since it originally came out in the movies. I was only 10 at the time so I didn't get it and I remember not being crazy about it. ALthough the song "I believe in you" was a favorite of mine. I actually looked at the TV schedule to see what else was on. And I vowed to change the channel at 12, the coming hour. But a funny thing happened, I forgot about the other movie and I remained glued to the screen and saw it to the end. The movie is about a window washer who pledges to become a CEO within a short time by reading a "How To Book", hence the title. How delightful to see Michelle Lee singing..what a voice. I didn't remember her singing I Believe in You. Then we have Robert Morse. I was never a big fan of the slap stick comedy ala Jim Carrey Chevy Chase and Robin Wiliams. Robert Morse could give them all a few lessons on playing broad comedy without going over board. Rudy Vallee and the man who played Big Deal in West Side Story (one of my favorite musicals) were hilarious. He was the nephew of the CEO Vallee so we all know what type of character he was playing. We also have the CEO's bimbo girlfriend who wants to get out of the Secretary pool. She actually is not as dumb as we are suppose to think she is. It was a very upbeat funny movie. And for some reason I believe a lot of people in the business world probably know even less then the Robert Morse character, a window washer Maybe they should read the same type of book he was reading. This musical actually would be good if it was just the story. The book could stand on its own. I felt the same way about Carousel. Which deals with very serious issues. The music adds to the story which IMO separates a OK musicals from a great musical. This is a great musical. Oh beware a few songs were cut for the film. The Broadway musical was almost 3 hours, as a lot are. They have intermissions on Broadway. So they cut musical numbers from movie musicals. They did that with Guys and Dolls, one of the great songs at that. HTSIBWRT they cut the Coffee break scene, a great scene. So just as a caution to people who look at movie versions of Broadway musicals. Don't expect to see/hear all of the songs. It's a dumb practice because there are movies made now which are running 3 hours which have a whole lot less going for them then a Broadway musical.